Hard to Forgive
by the oot
Summary: Liberating the gem empire has an unforeseen consequence. The extent of Steven's compassion is tested.
1. Hypnobirds - Point of Departure

There would be no energy wasted during the long trip. None for moving. None for thinking. None for feeling. The course was set. Nothing else mattered.

* * *

Vast blackness extended at a mind-boggling scale in every direction. A profound emptiness interrupted only by sparse suspended points of light. They were too distant and silent to be anything but cold company. It was enough to make even the greatest of beings lonely. No matter.

* * *

Stray stellar winds prickled the skin between stretches of true vacuum. A pulsar winked its eye tauntingly over and over. The endless field of sparkling stars crawled by in parallax as they were traversed at relativistic speeds. No matter.

* * *

To the right, a towering violet nebula unfurled like a soft cloudy flower taking a hundred million years to blossom. Newly born stars clung to its petals like shining dewdrops. Some of of them would someday have worlds. Some of those worlds would be... no matter.

* * *

So it went. How long had this drifting lasted? Hours? Days? Weeks? They were nothing next to the millenia of waiting that had preceded them. But then, just as it was starting to seem like it would never come, it did. The Solar system was in view. That mattered.

The third planet, blue and rocky, was unmistakably Earth. Yet there was nothing on it but small structures; nothing around it but gently swirling white clouds and tiny, flimsy communication satellites. Somehow, it had no planetary or orbital defenses. That mattered.

There was a pair of continents in one hemisphere connected by a thin strand of land near the planet's equator. About halfway toward a pole, on one of the coasts, there was a faint scent.

It smelled like Gems. That matt-


	2. Jeff Liu - Opening Instrumental Demo

Steven felt something lightly tap his forehead and stick between his eyebrows. Blinking the sleep out of his eyes, it took a second for him to be lucid enough to recognize Amethyst perched on the headboard of his bed. Her face was upside-down from his point of view, and she had … something in her mouth.

"Yo, Steven! You were making some weird faces. Did you have a cool dream?"

"Oh, uh," Steven said to stall as he sat up and scratched the back of his head. Did he have a dream? All he could remember was….

His recollection was interrupted by Amethyst. She'd climbed down and was now licking Steven where he'd felt the tap earlier. He'd known her so long it didn't really faze him, and he just treated it like an overly affectionate dog. "Haha, c'mon, cut it out. What are you doing?"

Amethyst pulled away once she'd gotten all of it. "Sorryyyy, I just dropped some on you." That was when Steven noticed she had somehow obtained, and was holding, an actual honeycomb. This wasn't especially surprising to him either. When she bit into it, syrupy red-orange honey oozed out of the cells and stuck around around her mouth.

"Yeah, just try not to get any on my bed," Steven said lightheartedly as he hopped out. After shooing Amethyst out of his room and getting dressed, he skipped down the stairs to find Pearl and Garnet waiting in the kitchenette for him.

"Good morning, Steven!" Pearl sing-songed brightly, joining her hands together with a clap. "Is our big man ready for his big day?"

"He was born ready," Garnet said with a single nod.

"'Course I am!" Steven said with laughter in his voice. It was the third anniversary of the day Steven changed the course of the Gem empire's history. To celebrate the newfound peace and freedom, there was a multi-day gala spectacular being thrown for all gemkind. This was the day gem tourists from all over the galaxy would be coming to Earth where it all started. Mostly partying around Beach City and the temple where he lived.

"Hey, tell them about your cool dream," Amethyst encouraged as she sucked the remaining honey off each of her fingertips in sequence.

Steven squinted as he tried again to remember. Suddenly, he felt ravenously hungry. Like he was going to starve to death if he didn't eat everything in sight. Maybe it was just smelling that sweet clover honey scent while he was asleep that did it.

"I don't really remember, it was probably just about going to Funland or something," Steven rationalized. "Anyway, I gotta make some breakfast."

"No you don't," said Garnet with a knowing smirk and an adjustment of her visor.

Steven raised an eyebrow.

"That's riiiight!" Pearl joined in. It was just then Steven noticed they had been standing together the whole time so as to block the view of the breakfast bar. They stepped apart at the same time, like it was rehearsed, to show multiple plates teeming with Together Breakfasts of pancakes, whipped cream, strawberries, and bacon. "Ta-da!"

"Aw, you guys! This is so great! Thanks!" Steven said with his eyes sparkling ecstatically.

"No prob dude," said Amethyst, grinning.

Pearl, with an effort, refrained from pointing out that Amethyst hadn't helped with the preparation at all, to avoid spoiling the moment. "I added the protein to give you all the nutrients necessary for humans to get strong," she explained.

"He's already strong," said Garnet.

"StrongER," Pearl corrected herself with a smile.


	3. Neutral Milk Hotel - Untitled

The festive atmosphere was overwhelming.

Greg couldn't believe how many Gems were on the boardwalk that day. Every shape size and color, many new to him, packed together like the little town was the world's most popular amusement park. Most of them had never even seen a human in person before, and they showed it with their curious stares. He took it in stride, knowing he'd want to stare too, but being the center of attention made him a little uncomfortable. It might have surprised people who knew him as a rock star, but performing in front of a crowd is different than _existing_ in front of a crowd. Like wearing an outfit you put together yourself versus being naked.

It was a relief when he saw three Gems he actually knew. Amethyst gave him a nonchalant wave on his way over, but Pearl and Garnet were too absorbed in an argument to notice him coming.

"… just a meteor," Garnet finished firmly.

"Then why didn't it break up on its way through the atmosphere?" Pearl countered.

"Very dense. Either way, we didn't pick up any Gem readings. Relax." At that point Garnet finally turned to the man standing there. "Greg," she said in a tone that would have come off as businesslike to a stranger, but Greg knew that was a friendly greeting by her standards.

"Hey," Greg said with a sheepish smile. "Talking about Gem stuff?"

"No. Not Gem stuff," said Garnet, looking at Pearl pointedly.

Pearl sighed, quickly accepting defeat. Then her face brightened. "Hello, my Um Greg Universe."

Greg laughed, a little tensely for the first second before Amethyst and Pearl joined in. It was such a relief that the incident she was making reference to was far enough in the past that they could joke about it, and that Pearl didn't have any hard feelings. Out of the Crystal Gems she was the most awkward at humor, but she nailed that bit perfectly.

"So, enjoying the festivities?" Greg asked after the laughter died down.

"Aww yeah, you know it! I'm teaching everybody how to eat food AND how to throw it up after a ride!" beamed Amethyst.

"Within reason," assured Pearl.

Garnet just shrugged.

"Well, that's… good to hear. It kinda of reminds me of a music festival I played at once. Boy, that was a disaster." He realized they probably wouldn't understand what was so bad about Guy Fieri and Kid Rock doing an acoustic set together, so he didn't go any further into detail. "-Anyway, have you guys seen Steven? I can't find him anywhere."

"Hm… no, I don't believe so," said Pearl.

"Did you check the high striker at Funland?" Garnet asked (rhetorically?), and adjusted her visor (knowingly?).

"Nope, great idea! I'll go do that right now. See you guys!" Greg was already waving and walking away before he finished talking. He always tried to leave conversations as quickly as possible when they might otherwise stall and get awkward. Plus, he really did want to see how Steven was doing. Maybe he was being mobbed by his fans and Greg could give him an excuse to step away in private.

As he made his way there he noticed that the city's old loudspeakers, which had been providing tunes for the event, were playing Scarlet Begonias. It came out after Pigpen died, but they honored his memory by making sure it was still terrible. Yeesh. This was how Earth's music and culture was being represented? He should've been consulted. He was bankrolling the whole thing, after all. He'd laid down a couple million to be distributed to Gems as they arrived, since they wouldn't have currency to participate in all the fun otherwise.

He was glad he did it, even if the festival wasn't exactly his scene. Funland itself was even more packed and chaotic, but luckily the high striker's tower was tall enough for him to find it easily, even through the storm of multicolored banners, streamers and confetti in the sky. And wouldn't you know it, Garnet was right. Steven was right there, getting ready to give it a shot.

The Gems weren't crowding Steven like Greg had expected. They were keeping a respectful, maybe even reverent distance. Greg had been thinking Steven was like a rock star to them, but this made him realize Steven was more like a religious leader or king. Former king. Either way the only people close to him were Mr. Smiley and… oh, Connie.

Steven was already rubbing his hands and testing the weight of the mallet to get ready, so Greg decided not to greet him just yet. Wouldn't want to distract him and jinx it. Steven gave the crowd an impish teenage grin, then Connie shouted something that was unintelligible over the din but clearly cheering him on, which made him turn more serious. Maybe even slightly embarrassed.

Steven slowly and dramatically raised the mallet above his head, then even further back, staring down the lever like it all that stood between him and his destiny. Finally he swung down in a lightning fast arc and hit that lever like a bomb. The puck rose up, struck the bell, then kept going until it was sailing into the sky. Yep, that was Greg's boy alright. Everyone cheered, but Mr. Smiley didn't look particularly surprised, and the puck was caught by a flying gem that had been circling overhead. There must have been a lot of Gems completely clobbering it today.

It was time for Steven to get his prize, and he deferred to Connie, who pointed at one. Mr. Smiley took it down and handed it over with total resignation. Greg recognized it as Leatherfreak, a horror movie slasher who cannibalized his victims and sewed their skin to his body, which was covered with different shades of patches all joined with coarse stitching. Except this one had a huge head and eyes with a little grumpy mouth, supposedly to be cute. Jeepers creepers, something wasn't quite right with kids nowadays.

Watching Connie cradle that thing, it hit him. His Shtooball was on a date. This would be the worst possible time to talk to him. Just the purest style cramping. He was pretty sure Steven hadn't seen him, so he maturely and graciously turned to go. He'd have plenty of time to see Steven later and congratulate him on that hit.

But after a few steps of wading through the crowd, Greg felt some arms squeezing his waist from behind. It wasn't a Gem confused about Earth greetings. He'd know that hug anywhere.

"Hey dad," said Steven's bright face after Greg turned around.

"Hey buddy."


	4. Vainio & Vigroux - Ne Te Retourne Pas

Turquoise was thankful to be back in the dark, quiet Reliquary. The gala had been an entertaining diversion, sure. Fantastical beyond description, et cetera. But all the glaring lights and gaudy colors gave her a headache, especially when they were magnified through her ocular enhancers. And the music, the dances… it was all too strange, too garish. Too new.

She was made for older things. As a turquoise, her job was attending to legacy technology that couldn't be modernized for practical or cultural reasons. Then again, her predecessor had also been one, yet chose to leave the Reliquary when Gems were given job choice. Can you imagine? Giving up work at one of the most significant repositories of gem history? Oh well, Turquoise wouldn't have been promoted to the vacant position otherwise.

Since then, she had spent all her time exploring these vaulted ceilings, obscure alcoves, and glass containment chambers, yet still felt like a newcomer. She didn't even know the exact nature of the disturbance she was currently looking into. All she knew was that it was some sort of artifact that required frequent adjustments to its environment, often more than once per hour. She must have missed a few while she was at the gala, because when she got back, the painfully generic "Check Sector 00009-D" light was on and she had to set off to look into it.

That was one thing that made work at the Reliquary difficult. It was made of layers of technology that grew older and older toward the heart of the facility, like tiers of sediment in the ground containing more and more ancient artifacts. This meant each new addition to the complex had to interface with the deprecated codes and archaic language of the previous, resulting in some of the nuance inevitably being lost. By the time data reached her workstation in the newest area, it had undergone several iterations of this process and was incredibly vague.

When she arrived at the first boundary with an earlier age, the message on the obsolete rounded display was only slightly more specific. "Check Sector 00009-D – Urgent." She found her pace becoming slightly more brisk as she hoped to deal with this before it caused an embarrassment so early in her career. As was her habit on this type of excursion, she took time to admire the area's construction as she passed through it. From the power conduits to the display stands, everything was just a little more impractical, a little less elegant. Many devices quietly hummed and buzzed in a way some might have found annoying. Yet it brought out a warm feeling of nostalgia in her all the same. All of it from just before the fall of the Empire.

The next display she passed had a more rectangular design and blockier text. "𝙱𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚌𝚑 𝙸𝚗 𝚂𝚎𝚌𝚝𝚘𝚛 𝟶𝟶𝟶𝟿𝙳 ." That was annoying. She was going to have to clean something up and report it. Her PDA swung in her arms and her coat flapped out behind her as she powerwalked through the section, and for the first time a fleeting moment of unease passed over her. The things here were genuinely exotic. Some of them dangerous due to unshielded actuators and transformers, some of them needlessly complex, some of them using designs that simply didn't exist anymore. The artifacts, too, were more mysterious, with reasons for containment that were no longer common knowledge.

Turquoise was tense by the time she saw the warm yellow light coming off the next wall display, and more tense after she read it. "𝕰𝖘𝖈𝖆𝖕𝖊 𝕴𝖓 𝕻𝖊𝖓𝖎𝖙𝖊𝖓𝖙𝖎𝖆𝖗𝖞 𝕹𝖎𝖓𝖊 𝕯𝖊𝖊" It was an old Gem dialect, but of course she was fluent. It meant this wasn't a regular breach. It was something sapient. It could be actively doing more damage. This was normally her favorite era of the Reliquary, but she jogged through it too quickly too appreciate the baroque, flowing decorations illuminated by golden flickering lights. There was no time to wonder about the relics here, many of which were almost mythical in their inscrutability and power, most of them caked in dust.

The next era, the one containing 9-D, loomed in the distance like the gullet of a beast. Its perimeter display sat there dim, crude, and strangely organic in design. There was no text here. Only a single rune, pulsing a warning. It looked like a pickaxe with a long, thick shaft. Even she had to dig deep into her memory for its esoteric significance, but what she found couldn't be right. She dropped her PDA and broke into an all out sprint. The red lights thrummed. Low sounds of groaning, grinding, growling seemed to come from every direction. The artifacts - left in shadows, sometimes choked in vegetation from lack of care - were like lost memories from infancy. This had to be a nightmare.

Finally she stumbled through the worn threshold of the containment chamber she was looking for. What was once a checkerboard stone floor was now an enormous, cracked crater of rubble. She saw the reason this room had required so many adjustments: the stasis field generators, stronger than any in current use, drew an enormous amount of power with fluctuations whenever there was resistance. Now they lay toppled and broken in the corners of the room.

All Turquoise could do was sink to her knees. Helpless. Terrified. Ashamed. At first she stared up at the stars through the hole roughly torn out of the once-pristine domed ceiling. Then her head fell and she sat there, motionless. She wished the Empire still shattered gems. That would be better than living with herself, knowing what she was responsible for.


End file.
